Sony announces the PS4’s first original hour-long TV show, Powers

Yesterday at the Game Developers Conference, Sony announced its own virtual reality headset for the PlayStation 4, and it could even beat the Oculus Rift — which has been a development kit for about a year-and-a-half now — to market. At CES in January, Sony announced PlayStation Now, a Netflix-style streaming service for video games that doesn’t even need a set-top box to function. Now, Sony has announced its first attempt at original programming for the PS4, and it’s actually a notable property.

The superpower police procedural Powers, created by writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Michael Avon Oeming back in 2000, will be hitting the PlayStation 4. Produced by Sony Pictures TV, the hour-long procedural will stream through the PlayStation Network in a similar fashion to Netflix or Hulu streaming. The series has not begun shooting yet, but the budget is said to be in the ballpark of a Showtime or HBO series, which is surprisingly significant for a show that may only ever air through a video game console’s online storefront.

The show will be exclusive to the PlayStation Network in the United States, and Sony Pictures TV will sell the rights to international broadcasters. Sony hasn’t announced the pricing as of yet, but it would be a savvy move if Sony included its original programming with the PS Plus monthly subscription, similar to how Amazon Instant Video is included with the price of Amazon Prime.

However you feel about Brian Michael Bendis or even hour-long procedurals, Powers is at least a somewhat fresh take on the genre. The officials will be investigating crimes perpetrated by superpowered beings rather than spending 35 minutes bouncing from workplace to workplace grilling innocent employees about a suspect’s relationship with his or her coworkers.

Microsoft announced a Halo television series when it originally showed off the Xbox One, but that project has yet to be green lit. So, it would seem Powers — like Sony’s virtual reality helmet — could beat a rival’s competing product to market, a timetable of which Sony is most certainly aware.